Is there any way to save a floppy?

Posted by: visuvius

Is there any way to save a floppy? - 02/08/2002 16:08

I have a floppy with some rather important Word .doc files on it. I tried to open from it today and it sat there with the green light on for about 20 seconds then it says

"Data Error (Cyclic Redundancy Check)" - WTF?

It doesn't look physical broken or damaged from the outside? Is there anyway to recover the files that are on it or am i screwed?

When i try to open it from My Computer, it says its not Formatted and asks if i'd like to format.
Posted by: AndrewT

Re: Is there any way to save a floppy? - 02/08/2002 16:18

Clean the heads in your floppy drive if you have a cleaning floppy and if that doesn't help then try to read the floppy in as many other drives as you possibly can. It's surprising how some drives will read disks others can't. One other thing that sometimes helps if to eject & re-insert & keep trying.

Have you checked for viruses?
Posted by: visuvius

Re: Is there any way to save a floppy? - 02/08/2002 17:50

yeah i have checked for viruses. Man, this really sucks. I'll go try in other computers now...
Posted by: AndrewT

Re: Is there any way to save a floppy? - 02/08/2002 18:13

One quick note: Whatever you do with that precious floppy of yours, try to keep it write-protected and don't let any disk repair prog's near it unless you either feel:
a) Desperate -or-
b) Confident

Lastly, what's on it, a flat text document, something with fancy tables, how big is the file etc? The former improves your chances of a 'rough' recovery with a sector editor.

Lastly, Word is crap with error reporting, I mean really crap. See if you can copy the file elsewhere before opening it.
Posted by: visuvius

Re: Is there any way to save a floppy? - 02/08/2002 18:44

Nothing terrible fancy is on the disc. Theres about 7 word doc's on it, 2 of which are rather important. I'm an idiot for not making a backup, but i had no clue the disc would go to crap out of no where.